Carver Crimson 275 Review (Tube Amp)

[voodooless]

I think it's pretty clear that Mr. Carver is keeping a controlled distance from BCC, and if push came to shove, would say, hey yes it's my design but I have no idea what they have done with it since I sold the company, you would need to check with them.

If the one called @Bob Carver really is Bob Carver, then that is precisely not what he did.

 

[Billy Budapest]

I posted on this earlier. The Bob Carver Corporation was incorporated in Washington but was administratively terminated (I posted a screenshot of that in my prior post). It is not incorporated in Illinois or California. Malitz has one corporation in Illinois, unrelated. The most they say publicly is that he and Wyred 4 Sound bought the Bob Carver Corporation, and Bob remains a "designer."

Bob and his wife owned 100% of Sunfire (confirmed in his patent infringement litigation documents). They sold that company in 2011 for millions (lots). I guess he gets bored. He started hand-building amps and selling them on eBay occasionally. Then he got talked into coming out of retirement by a guy he worked with at Sunfire and ELAN and they formed Bob Carver, L.L.C in 2019. They made some big power tube amps but I guess that didn't go too far. Then Bob starts the Bob Carver Corporation in Washington and sells out to Malitz and they move all production to CA at Wyred 4 Sound. He has no ownership in that company , and it is legally defunct as far as I can tell, which means current owners would have individual/personal liability.

My speculation is that Mr. Carver being paid a royalty for each amp sold, or gets some sort of consulting compensation as he seems to come in and back the design through the dealer that popped in here briefly. But Mr. C only seems to talk about the design, information on the specifics on the current build, the safety issue, the quality control person, that seems to all be coming from Mr. Malitz.

I think it's pretty clear that Mr. Carver is keeping a controlled distance from BCC, and if push came to shove, would say, hey yes it's my design but I have no idea what they have done with it since I sold the company, you would need to check with them.

You are missing quite a few years here. The Bob Carver LLC amps starting with the Black Beauty were released in 2012 and I believe manufactured in Washington. At some point, the Bob Carver amp operation was sold to Emotiva and production was shifted to Franklin, TN. Then at some point after that, the current company was formed with production apparently subcontracted to Wyrd4Sound in California. For all three of the Bob Carver signature amplifier companies, the products looks very similar but appear to be different designs.

 

[JP]

I thought that at first as well. Someone (an EE) mentioned it in another forum stating that "all of your other gear is UL rated" so I did some research. None of the big-name high-end manufacturers get UL ratings (Mark Levinson, McIntosh, Conrad Johnson, Audio Research just to name a few of the 20 or 30 I checked). You can verify this on the UL site for yourself. So I wondered why. My electric pencil sharpener, made in USA, UL, my undercabinet lights, UL, my power strip, UL. Why? So I asked my EE friend who is Chief Acoustical Engineer at a major speaker company and he said "because you have to submit 6 samples of your product to UL, some or all of which will be subjected to destructive testing, they take it all the way to critical failure." On products that have to be rated, like in-ceiling and architectural speakers (in commercial space) because of building and electrical codes, they submit and get the UL rating because everyone in that market must do so also. Six Mac MC275 Anniv. editions is $36,000 retail in product, plus the testing/certification costs. Oh, and it takes at least a year.

However, Mac and many others have the familiar "CE" on the back of their amp, which means it was certified to sell in EU. It's a completely different process. There are many, many companies in competition with one another who will certify your product for a fee. Like vehicle/smog inspections in some states. It doesn't require destructive testing, can be done quickly. So many will get CE and quit. The fact an amp maker doesn't get a UL listing isn't of any significance one way or the other. Now if they submitted it and it failed, that's a big, big deal if it reached the market without changes, etc.

Last products I did (10+ years ago) we did CE and TUV/cTUVus, the latter being one of several NRTL. We would’ve only considered UL if it was mandated.

 

[Robbo99999]

You replied to a comment I had made... correct?

In the body of your reply to me you stated "You chose to ignore your country's laws."

Are we clear?

You should be locked up man! (not that I agree with your viewpoint, albeit I'm quoting a post from many many pages past).

EDIT: sorry, this post makes no sense because I quoted such an old post where everyone would have of course forgotten the context because it occurred 20 pages ago!

 

[anmpr1]

You are missing quite a few years here...

The corporate 'history' of these little (and they are little) tube amps is certainly convoluted. At this late stage, there doesn't seem to be much point in any of it. I mean, going from PL, to Carver, to Sunfire, to the original Silver Seven etc... all those products were more consistent than not, as far as Bob's 'magic' went. This thing, I just don't get.

Consider other 'names with history'. We often encounter 'changes' in corporate ownership, but I don't quite recall anything exactly like this situation. Certainly not any that have fallen so low. Of course there are 'names' like Nakamichi, but current Nak doesn't attempt to represent their past in any meaningful way, and is instead just a brand for selling junky mass market 'lifestyle' products.

McIntosh: In spite of their shameless pandering to the idiocy and fashion consciousness of their moneyed customers, when you buy a big Mac amplifier, you are still getting a big Mac amplifier; one that, as far as I know, is going to meet specs.

Mark Levinson: the trip through Madrigal, Harman, and now Samsung has been pretty consistent-- no one has ever discounted what that name represents, beef-wise (at least their amps--the other stuff I can't say).

Even an outfit on the cutting edge of tube-tweak, ARC, has been consistent in their offerings; for those who want that sort of thing they've always pretty much offered the same to their customers.

As I said, I just don't get this thing.

 

[Billy Budapest]

The corporate 'history' of these little (and they are little) tube amps is certainly convoluted. At this late stage, there doesn't seem to be much point in any of it. I mean, going from PL, to Carver, to Sunfire, to the original Silver Seven etc... all those products were more consistent than not, as far as Bob's 'magic' went. This thing, I just don't get.

Consider other 'names with history'. We often encounter 'changes' in corporate ownership, but I don't quite recall anything exactly like this situation. Certainly not any that have fallen so low. Of course there are 'names' like Nakamichi, but current Nak doesn't attempt to represent their past in any meaningful way, and is instead just a brand for selling junky mass market 'lifestyle' products.

McIntosh: In spite of their shameless pandering to the idiocy and fashion consciousness of their moneyed customers, when you buy a big Mac amplifier, you are still getting a big Mac amplifier; one that, as far as I know, is going to meet specs.

Mark Levinson: the trip through Madrigal, Harman, and now Samsung has been pretty consistent-- no one has ever discounted what that name represents, beef-wise (at least their amps--the other stuff I can't say).

Even an outfit on the cutting edge of tube-tweak, ARC, has been consistent in their offerings; for those who want that sort of thing they've always pretty much offered the same to their customers.

As I said, I just don't get this thing.

Of the “big” tube amp companies, I think the only one without a convoluted ownership history is Conrad-Johnson—just a smooth transition to a former employee. At first, I thought VTL was in this category too, but then I remembered the break off with David Manley which I seem to remember was acrimonious, with dad taking his designs with him and sons having to restart VTL. After which, Manley was selling some of the same amps that were previously marketed as VTL. Then Manley’s widow took over the company and spun it in a different direction.

Of them all, I think Jolida’s story has the most intrigue.

 

[MakeMineVinyl]

Dynaco is another company which has taken a circuitous route through history through multiple owners (Sound Values, Panor, and who-know-who-else) yet their product is essentially intact and accounted for at DynaKitParts.com, from whom I've purchased some parts to keep my Dynas going. I don't know what they do with chassis grounding with the new production of the classic designs, but Dynaco amps always more or less met their specs.

Another such company is SAE which is still going strong under the ATI, Theta, BGW, and Datasat umbrella and the same owner/designer (Morris Kessler) who founded the company. I'd put Morris right up there with the other legendary designers.

 

[Prana Ferox]

I thought that at first as well. Someone (an EE) mentioned it in another forum stating that "all of your other gear is UL rated" so I did some research. None of the big-name high-end manufacturers get UL ratings (Mark Levinson, McIntosh, Conrad Johnson, Audio Research just to name a few of the 20 or 30 I checked).
...
However, Mac and many others have the familiar "CE" on the back of their amp, which means it was certified to sell in EU. It's a completely different process. There are many, many companies in competition with one another who will certify your product for a fee. Like vehicle/smog inspections in some states. It doesn't require destructive testing, can be done quickly. So many will get CE and quit. The fact an amp maker doesn't get a UL listing isn't of any significance one way or the other. Now if they submitted it and it failed, that's a big, big deal if it reached the market without changes, etc.

I see this the other way. If you are selling retail products in the US that run on line voltage, you get UL certified. If you sell equipment with hazardous voltages that is intended to be routinely touched by humans, you get UL certified. I deal with equipment that costs waaaaay more than McIntosh amps and they get UL certified. Yes, I get that it's a bit of a racket but it gets the job done.

It's part of the business transition between hand-building stuff in your shop and becoming a proper LLC with an assembly and testing chain. Internal testing should also include destructive, and there are lots of ways the finance report impact is less than 'we lost six retail units' implies.

The fact that these big name, established corporations don't do this, I see as part of their continuing flim-flam to prey on big-buck audiophile ignorance to get ridiculous margin on product that's not worth it, and in some cases is just plain not built properly.

E: I say 'big name' knowing these are firmly small-cap, we're not talking Yamaha here, but a consumer buying their products in a retail store assumes a full and competent product design and support chain.

 

[Gringoaudio1]

I thought that at first as well. Someone (an EE) mentioned it in another forum stating that "all of your other gear is UL rated" so I did some research. None of the big-name high-end manufacturers get UL ratings (Mark Levinson, McIntosh, Conrad Johnson, Audio Research just to name a few of the 20 or 30 I checked). You can verify this on the UL site for yourself. So I wondered why. My electric pencil sharpener, made in USA, UL, my undercabinet lights, UL, my power strip, UL. Why? So I asked my EE friend who is Chief Acoustical Engineer at a major speaker company and he said "because you have to submit 6 samples of your product to UL, some or all of which will be subjected to destructive testing, they take it all the way to critical failure." On products that have to be rated, like in-ceiling and architectural speakers (in commercial space) because of building and electrical codes, they submit and get the UL rating because everyone in that market must do so also. Six Mac MC275 Anniv. editions is $36,000 retail in product, plus the testing/certification costs. Oh, and it takes at least a year.

However, Mac and many others have the familiar "CE" on the back of their amp, which means it was certified to sell in EU. It's a completely different process. There are many, many companies in competition with one another who will certify your product for a fee. Like vehicle/smog inspections in some states. It doesn't require destructive testing, can be done quickly. So many will get CE and quit. The fact an amp maker doesn't get a UL listing isn't of any significance one way or the other. Now if they submitted it and it failed, that's a big, big deal if it reached the market without changes, etc.

Thank for that. Yes of course it is onerous to get UL. And the cost of the UL fees alone is a lot not including the units you have to send. Fortunately the stuff I design (electrical enclosures, etc) are inexpensive.
So I retract some of the vitriolic post I made. I got caught up in the mobbing of this amplifier. But at least the designers should understand safe design principles for their own protection if nothing else. The liability is just too great.
And the assembly sub-contractor is legally liable as well. I cannot believe they blindly build this thing without questioning the design! How on earth can they willingly assemble it with unsafe grounding and then do the final QC and test where it surely fails to meets specs!!??

 

[audio2design]

Oh, and it takes at least a year.

However, Mac and many others have the familiar "CE" on the back of their amp, which means it was certified to sell in EU. It's a completely different process. There are many, many companies in competition with one another who will certify your product for a fee. Like vehicle/smog inspections in some states. It doesn't require destructive testing, can be done quickly. So many will get CE and quit. The fact an amp maker doesn't get a UL listing isn't of any significance one way or the other. Now if they submitted it and it failed, that's a big, big deal if it reached the market without changes, etc.

If I pay an expedite fee, I can usually get my NOA, notice of assessment in 4 weeks from UL, and 6 weeks till it is live on the UL site. Currently with Covid running about 2 weeks longer. Standard time is 6 weeks to NOA.

The difference between CE and UL is that CE is a self-declaration. You can do the tests internally. I expect many small companies who slap CE on their products do just that, slap CE on their product. The actual validation testing, done properly, would essentially the same as UL. To meet the requirements of our insurer, we use a 3rd party to complete CE testing, and it is done at the same time as UL which keeps the costs down. For many end customers, and effectively to sell in many European countries depending on the channel, CE is not enough. You will need ENEC too. ENEC would be the 3rd party equivalent of CE and would be more equivalent to UL (and equivalent).

 

[EJ Sarmento]

To the ASR readership and others interested, of course the thread that relates to the Carver 275 has come to my attention. I feel the need to comment and offer some clarity as it relates to my involvement and sphere of influence in this matter.

Glass Audio was born to provide an extension to serving the Bob Carver Legacy. Bob is well known to people around the world as a purveyor of great sound and innovative engineering.

Wyred 4 Sound did not purchase Bob Carver Company as stated earlier in this thread. Glass Audio was formed to obtain a license to build the brand using the Bob Carver name. Frank Malitz was a partner in Glass Audio which had been disbanded at the end of 2021 for several reasons (Supply Chain chief amongst them), and was shut down permanently the first week of the New Year. The Bob Carver company is completely owned by Bob and his family.

We are proud of our business. We are equally proud of our work for our brands as well as others. We do not believe in “revisionist history.” We built according to the design of Bob Carver. We are certainly sorry that the interpretation of this has taken on a life other than intended.

The days ahead will bring further clarity to this situation. That said, we do certainly look forward to working with ASR in the future.

EJ Sarmento
President – Wyred 4 Sound

 

[DonH56]

To the ASR readership and others interested, of course the thread that relates to the Carver 275 has come to my attention. I feel the need to comment and offer some clarity as it relates to my involvement and sphere of influence in this matter.

Glass Audio was born to provide an extension to serving the Bob Carver Legacy. Bob is well known to people around the world as a purveyor of great sound and innovative engineering.

Wyred 4 Sound did not purchase Bob Carver Company as stated earlier in this thread. Glass Audio was formed to obtain a license to build the brand using the Bob Carver name. Frank Malitz was a partner in Glass Audio which had been disbanded at the end of 2021 for several reasons (Supply Chain chief amongst them), and was shut down permanently the first week of the New Year. The Bob Carver company is completely owned by Bob and his family.

We are proud of our business. We are equally proud of our work for our brands as well as others. We do not believe in “revisionist history.” We built according to the design of Bob Carver. We are certainly sorry that the interpretation of this has taken on a life other than intended.

The days ahead will bring further clarity to this situation. That said, we do certainly look forward to working with ASR in the future.

EJ Sarmento
President – Wyred 4 Sound

Thank you clarifying the relationship and welcome to ASR.

 

[Mnyb]

Re it’s transient power ability, it’s seems to exist as seen in measurement at 1kHz but does it exist in the bass ? Given the OPT issues discovered ?

Actually do we have any dynamic power where it’s needed the most in the bass ?

 

[Travis]

McIntosh: In spite of their shameless pandering to the idiocy and fashion consciousness of their moneyed customers, when you buy a big Mac amplifier, you are still getting a big Mac amplifier; one that, as far as I know, is going to meet specs.

Mark Levinson: the trip through Madrigal, Harman, and now Samsung has been pretty consistent-- no one has ever discounted what that name represents, beef-wise (at least their amps--the other stuff I can't say).

With Mac, it is always going to exceed specs, that has been shown over and over again, especially with the MC275 Anniversary Edition.

However, all of these audio companies tend to have a business side and a design/engineering side. Someone mentioned in a previous post that they had experience with product life cycles, and this is always the case in audio. All of these smaller brands that really have good design and engineering get swallowed up by large audio companies or venture capital firms and they evolve. The founders, however, all typically move on and do something else, again, and again, and again.

I know a lot about Mark Levinson and MLAS because I was in school in New Haven at the time all of that was happening and the eventual owner of MLAS/Madrigal was one of my professors. Levinson was having serious financial difficulties with MLAS and he was put in touch with a then retired Sandy Berlin, who was teaching at Yale. Sandy invested with his own money and got other investors. The company still went into involuntary bankruptcy and was purchased by a company Sandy created, Madrigal. Sandy got MLAS into lower-end products to boost sales and profits, and then the HT brand Proceed. Sandy eventually sold Madrigal, including MLAS, to Harman (he had originally brokered the deal to get some of the brands Harman had sold off from General Instruments back into Sidney Harman's hands). After Madrigal/MLAS was bought by Harman, Sandy went with it to Harman where he was sent to head up JBL, and then to the UK to be the chief of Tannoy, and then later to start a whole new speaker brand in Tennessee, which failed (Bolivar), eventually put in charge of starting up Revel. Everything he did was branding and finding the right segment. Some worked, some didn't.

Harman had its premium brand to compete with the likes of McIntosh and others where it sits today with 10K to $30K SS Amps, preamps, turntables, etc. The products are designed by a group of folks in CT at their "Electronics Engineering Center for Excellence" which is a centralized unit led by Todd Eichenbaum that does the engineering for the electronics for all of Harman's premium brands. Todd came from Krell. MLAS products are manufactured by Mack Technologies in MA. They took that brand, streamlined it, established 10, 20 and 30K pricepoints, put engineering in Harman's central engineering center, and outsourced the manufacturing. They do the same with all of their speaker brands out of Northridge, CA.

Meanwhile, before the time that MLAS went into bankruptcy Levinson left and founded Cello and took the two key engineers from MLAS with him (Tom Colangelo and Paul Jayson). That company went on for 12 years with major success (by high-end audio standards), and it eventually hit the end of it's life cycle and was sold (still in business today in Seattle, a shell of its former self doing integration, installation, subwoofers and tv wall mounts the last I heard).. From there ML started Red Rose (he met Kim Cattrell of Sex in the City, married her and co-wrote a book with her on the female orgasm), then shut that down and moved to Switzerland to start Daniel Hertz, building bespoke audio systems and working on his software to eq digital tracks from his relationship with Dick Burwin at Red Rose.

So the brains behind MLAS and Cello, Paul and Tom needed something to do after Cello shut down, so they started high-end Viola Audio Labs, high-end audio, small production stuff. This happens all the time. Some do good on there own, others not so much. You have to have good business people behind you.

I think what happened with Bob was he was just seriously bored. As I mentioned before, he was sitting at home building amps and selling them on eBay. Those went for some crazy money comparatively speaking, and a business/marketing guy that knew Bob saw an opportunity to capitalize on the name and build them in quantity. It's too bad the market segment was on the lower end and they took the product and tried to squeeze even more out of it.

 

[mhardy6647]

To the ASR readership and others interested, of course the thread that relates to the Carver 275 has come to my attention. I feel the need to comment and offer some clarity as it relates to my involvement and sphere of influence in this matter.

Glass Audio was born to provide an extension to serving the Bob Carver Legacy. Bob is well known to people around the world as a purveyor of great sound and innovative engineering.

Wyred 4 Sound did not purchase Bob Carver Company as stated earlier in this thread. Glass Audio was formed to obtain a license to build the brand using the Bob Carver name. Frank Malitz was a partner in Glass Audio which had been disbanded at the end of 2021 for several reasons (Supply Chain chief amongst them), and was shut down permanently the first week of the New Year. The Bob Carver company is completely owned by Bob and his family.

We are proud of our business. We are equally proud of our work for our brands as well as others. We do not believe in “revisionist history.” We built according to the design of Bob Carver. We are certainly sorry that the interpretation of this has taken on a life other than intended.

The days ahead will bring further clarity to this situation. That said, we do certainly look forward to working with ASR in the future.

EJ Sarmento
President – Wyred 4 Sound

Thanks for the info.
I still have confusion around one issue: How does "The Bob Carver Corporation" fit into all of this?

Bob Carver Tube Amplifiers | Bob Carver

Bob Carver's Direct to customer on-line store. Bob Carver vacuum tube amplifiers. Buy Carver direct @ bobcarvercorp.com

www.bobcarvercorp.com

Clicking "See for yourself" leads to...

(N.B. Both screenshots today were taken ca. 2:15pm ET on 23Jan2022)

Perhaps "The Bob Carver Corporation" was/is a DBA used by Glass Audio, or perhaps now for Wyred 4 Sound, and not a registered business entity per se?

Thanks!

 

[mhardy6647]

With Mac, it is always going to exceed specs, that has been shown over and over again, especially with the MC275 Anniversary Edition.

However, all of these audio companies tend to have a business side and a design/engineering side. Someone mentioned in a previous post that they had experience with product life cycles, and this is always the case in audio. All of these smaller brands that really have good design and engineering get swallowed up by large audio companies or venture capital firms and they evolve. The founders, however, all typically move on and do something else, again, and again, and again.

I know a lot about Mark Levinson and MLAS because I was in school in New Haven at the time all of that was happening and the eventual owner of MLAS/Madrigal was one of my professors. Levinson was having serious financial difficulties with MLAS and he was put in touch with a then retired Sandy Berlin, who was teaching at Yale. Sandy invested with his own money and got other investors. The company still went into involuntary bankruptcy and was purchased by a company Sandy created, Madrigal. Sandy got MLAS into lower-end products to boost sales and profits, and then the HT brand Proceed. Sandy eventually sold Madrigal, including MLAS, to Harman (he had originally brokered the deal to get some of the brands Harman had sold off from General Instruments back into Sidney Harman's hands). After Madrigal/MLAS was bought by Harman, Sandy went with it to Harman where he was sent to head up JBL, and then to the UK to be the chief of Tannoy, and then later to start a whole new speaker brand in Tennessee, which failed (Bolivar), eventually put in charge of starting up Revel. Everything he did was branding and finding the right segment. Some worked, some didn't.

Harman had its premium brand to compete with the likes of McIntosh and others where it sits today with 10K to $30K SS Amps, preamps, turntables, etc. The products are designed by a group of folks in CT at their "Electronics Engineering Center for Excellence" which is a centralized unit led by Todd Eichenbaum that does the engineering for the electronics for all of Harman's premium brands. Todd came from Krell. MLAS products are manufactured by Mack Technologies in MA. They took that brand, streamlined it, established 10, 20 and 30K pricepoints, put engineering in Harman's central engineering center, and outsourced the manufacturing. They do the same with all of their speaker brands out of Northridge, CA.

Meanwhile, before the time that MLAS went into bankruptcy Levinson left and founded Cello and took the two key engineers from MLAS with him (Tom Colangelo and Paul Jayson). That company went on for 12 years with major success (by high-end audio standards), and it eventually hit the end of it's life cycle and was sold (still in business today in Seattle, a shell of its former self doing integration, installation, subwoofers and tv wall mounts the last I heard).. From there ML started Red Rose (he met Kim Cattrell of Sex in the City, married her and co-wrote a book with her on the female orgasm), then shut that down and moved to Switzerland to start Daniel Hertz, building bespoke audio systems and working on his software to eq digital tracks from his relationship with Dick Burwin at Red Rose.

So the brains behind MLAS and Cello, Paul and Tom needed something to do after Cello shut down, so they started high-end Viola Audio Labs, high-end audio, small production stuff. This happens all the time. Some do good on there own, others not so much. You have to have good business people behind you.

I think what happened with Bob was he was just seriously bored. As I mentioned before, he was sitting at home building amps and selling them on eBay. Those went for some crazy money comparatively speaking, and a business/marketing guy that knew Bob saw an opportunity to capitalize on the name and build them in quantity. It's too bad the market segment was on the lower end and they took the product and tried to squeeze even more out of it.

Thanks @Travis -- really cool stuff, some of which I knew, some of which I didn't.
I assume your reference to Dick Burwin is a typo and actually refers to Dick Burwen?

 

[Travis]

You are missing quite a few years here. The Bob Carver LLC amps starting with the Black Beauty were released in 2012 and I believe manufactured in Washington. At some point, the Bob Carver amp operation was sold to Emotiva and production was shifted to Franklin, TN. Then at some point after that, the current company was formed with production apparently subcontracted to Wyrd4Sound in California. For all three of the Bob Carver signature amplifier companies, the products looks very similar but appear to be different designs.

Yes, I had that year wrong, Bob Carver, LLC in 2012 in Lexington, KY (not Washington), with his old pal from Sunfire:

"Lexington, Ky. – Bob Carver, audio inventor, and home
automation’s Bob Farinelli have formed a vacuum tube amplifier company called
Bob Carver LLC, based here, and are introducing its initial products.

Described in a statement as a company that “combines unconventional
thinking with precision engineering to create innovative audio products that
set new benchmarks in style and performance at affordable price points,” the
two founders worked together for five years at Sunfire and “came out of
retirement to join forces and found this new business.”

That sold to Jade/Emotiva.

Then Bob Carver Corporation was formed in Washington in 2014, defunct by June of 2016 (probably associated with sale to Frank with Ulises Hubbard, and then sold to Frank in ?????

He's running out of names, and the value is diminishing with every startup and sale. This is the polar opposite of Mark Levinson, the name was so strong that MLAS tried to get ML's name of everything at Cello, even showing up to audio shows to talk about Cello, or have his name in the "about section" that ML has started his new company MLAS.

All a shame really, but I guess it's no different with bands and musicians, playing the major stadiums in the 70s and 80s, only to wind up with a singer found on YouTube and playing every Indian Casino they possibly can to continue to do what they enjoy.


Bob's official involvement was ended long ago:

Business Name:
BOB CARVER CORPORATION
UBI Number:
603 415 011
Business Type:
WA PROFIT CORPORATION
Business Status:
ADMINISTRATIVELY DISSOLVED

Expiration Date:
06/30/2016
Jurisdiction:
UNITED STATES, WASHINGTON
Formation/ Registration Date:
06/24/2014
Period of Duration:
PERPETUAL
Inactive Date:
11/01/2016

 

[Travis]

Perhaps "The Bob Carver Corporation" was/is a DBA used by Glass Audio, or perhaps now for Wyred 4 Sound, and not a registered business entity per se?

Thanks!

That could be, but it's a major violation in every state to use the word Corporation in a dba, if the dba isn't in fact a limited liability entity. However, as far as the consumer is concerned, it is better. There is no limited liability, the principals, and agents who represent themselves as connected to the company face personal liability exposure.

I'm thinking more and more, that Bob sold it but financed it, and he helps push the product to make sure he gets paid. If they don't make the payments he takes it back, but there isn't really anything to take back, just the name and all of the debts and liability. That's just utter speculation. You don't typically stick around and support a company after you have sold it unless there is some financial connection. You move on to something else.

 

[Travis]

Thanks @Travis -- really cool stuff, some of which I knew, some of which I didn't.
I assume your reference to Dick Burwin is a typo and actually refers to Dick Burwen?

Major typo. Dick Burwen, thank you. He too has been a subject of discussions on this Forum, and his Bobcat software was amazing for the time.

 

[BrianD]

I have read this thread and have decided to respond to some things that really bother me. I think this is my first post here, I am usually just a consumer on these types of forums but sometimes I feel compelled to throw in my two cents worth (probably an accurate value assessment of what I have to say).

First of all, I have no connection to any audio company. I have never met Bob Carver. I do not own a tube amp of his, nor any tube amp for that matter. I am just an engineer that has worked in regulated industries my entire life, and dealt with both US and outside the US regulatory environment.

There have been many posts here saying in essence that crimes have been committed regarding this amp. There are two parts to US law, and up to now everything I have seen is only on the civil side of it. Accusing someone of a crime is different than saying that someone did something that leaves them subject to civil liability.

There have been many post from people in the EU referencing CE mark and related standards. The regulatory environment between the EU and US is very different. Unless someone is selling them in the EU, CE and its associated standards do not apply. You should not assume that the way the laws and regulations work in the EU is similar to the US, it is not. In the EU there is a much more consumer protection side of the regulations. For example if you are selling a product with a proprietary radio communication system in the US, the FCC doesn’t care if the receiver actually works or not just as long as it isn’t bleeding interfering RF out of the antenna. In the EU, there are performance requirements for the receiver that have nothing to do with protection of the RF environment, it only ensures that the radio actually works to some minimum standard of performance.

In the US, some have been referencing UL or the NEC. I could be wrong, but as far as I know there is no federal regulations that require any compliance to these codes or standards for a consumer audio power amplifier. The NEC as far as I know only applies to permanently installed equipment and wiring, not to consumer products sold to be plugged into the wall. Some local regulations may require UL but I don’t know of any national requirement. But unlike the EU and some other parts of the world, government regulations in the US cannot be under a copyright and most are easily found online so if I am wrong please show me. Most businesses do obtain UL or similar safety certification as a prudent business practice, but I don’t think this is universally required by law.

It seems almost universal here in this thread that the metal chassis of this amplifier must be grounded to be safe. This is not true, even following UL, CSA, or FM standards there are ways to do so without grounding the chassis. I am not making a judgement on this design (which seems to clearly not comply), but it is not sold with any markings that claims such compliance so you should not expect it to be built to these standards. But don’t state unequivocally that the chassis of a tube amp must be grounded to comply to UL or similar standards, it does not.

An exception to the normally low consumer protection aspect of US federal code is the part that was referenced here is that covering the measurement and specification of audio power amplifiers. That seems to have been an early attempt to provide some consumer protection in the early days of audio BS. But it was a failure. The total BS in the audio world is nearly universal now. Where is the federal enforcement of regulations regarding advertising for an $8,000 amplifier power cord with cryogenically aligned quantum foo unobtainium conductors that will make your amplifier sound five times better?

I think that unless someone can claim actual harm, there is nothing you can do about someone trying to sell this amplifier in the current audio market in the US. If you think the agency (sorry, I can’t remember which one) that has the regulation for performance specifications of audio amps will do something, you may be able to complain to them but unless you actually are the one who bought it and can claim the harm they might not do anything. And even then, I would not expect this issue to be high on their priority list. My moral code wouldn’t allow me to sell things like this, but others have a different opinion and may not see a problem in doing so.

But the thing that I don’t get is the passion and vitriol that has been put forward here regarding this little amp. I will do what is normal in the US, vote with my wallet and not buy this product. But an underpowered amp seems to be on the low end of the audio BS scale in the world today. I would challenge you to find some really expensive tube amplifiers (>$50k monoblocks) and test those and look at how they are built, I expect you will find similar results. Or why not buy some expensive power cords, interconnects, or little pieces of wood to hold up our speaker cables and test those? What about super expensive capacitors for speaker crossovers? Or pieces of special rock to place under our amplifier, or little bags of rocks to place on your wiring? These are far more serious cases of consumer fraud, but ”high end“ audio is all BS as far as I can tell.

I appreciate the performance testing of products here by Amir and others. But I am disappointed in the claims of criminality over this product, and find the outrage expressed by some excessive. I expect that some expressing outrage may have a business interest in tube amplifiers. And I feel that there has been a lot of misinformation about the regulatory environment in the US and how it works. There is a reason why we are considered by many to be a litigious society; it is the enforcement method that is used for many issues that in other parts of the world would be a function of the government. Whether you think this is right or wrong is irrelevant, it is the way it is here.

My personal preference is that Amir continue to test speakers, concentrate on that and continue to improve his capability in this area. I believe this is where there is the biggest real difference in audio performance.